iew the culinary preparations relating to
the absorption of less favoured individuals, and himself could have
joined the feast, had he possessed the stomach for it.

These good friends of his, the Mangeromas, conserved his life when
they found him almost dying, not, strange as it may appear, for
selfish banqueting purposes, but merely that he might return to his
own people. It seems rather paradoxical that they should have loved
one stranger so well as to spare him with suspicious kindness, and
love others to the extent of making them into table delicacies. The
explanation probably is that these Mangeromas were the reverse of
a certain foreign youth with only a small stock of English, who, on
being offered in New York a fruit he had never seen before, replied,
"Thank you, I eat only my acquaintances"--the Mangeromas eat only
their enemies.

Mr. Lange's account of his stay with these people, of their weapons,
habits, form of battle, and method of cooking the human captives,
etc., forms one of the specially interesting parts of the book, and
is at the same time a valuable contribution to the ethnology of the
western Amazon (or Maranon) region, where dwell numerous similar tribes
little known to the white man. Particularly notable is his description
of the wonderful wourahli (urari) poison, its extraordinary effect,
and the _modus operandi_ of its making; a poison used extensively
by Amazonian tribes but not made by all. He describes also the
bows and arrows, the war-clubs, and the very scientific weapon, the
blow-gun. He was fortunate in securing a photograph of a Mangeroma in
the act of shooting this gun. Special skill, of course, is necessary
for the effective use of this simple but terrible arm, and, like that
required for the boomerang or lasso, practice begins with childhood.

The region of Mr. Lange's almost fatal experiences, the region of
the Javary River (the boundary between Brazil and Peru), is one of
the most formidable and least known portions of the South American
continent. It abounds with obstacles to exploration of the most
overwhelming kind. Low, swampy, with a heavy rainfall, it is inundated
annually, like most of the Amazon basin, and at time of high water
the rivers know no limits. Lying, as it does, so near the equator,
the heat is intense and constant, oppressive even to the native. The
forest-growth--and it is forest wherever it is not river--is forced
as in a huge hothouse, and is so dense as t